Japanese Monks Walk Across New England to Remember Fukushima

Monks from Japan met with parishioners at Sunday, the anniversary of the earthquake that devestated northern Japan, including Plymouth's sister city, Shichigahama. The monks have walked from Seabrook to Plymouth and will continue on to Vermont Yankee for a rally March 21, according to Patch reader Janet Alfieri. "They feel that if the people can unite to stop the relicensing of the New England nuclear plants it will give others the hope and strength to take action," she said.

Friday, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission upheld a decision rejecting the post-Fukushima contention raised by Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley and Pilgrim Watch.

Pilgrim Watch still has three contentions on appeal with the NRC, according to Neil Sheehan, a public affairs official with the NRC. 

1.)   One dealing with accident cleanup – Denied by ASLB in August 2011

Here is what it asserts:

Until and unless some third party assumes responsibility for cleanup after a severe nuclear reactor accident to pre-accident conditions, sets a cleanup standard, and identifies a funding source, Entergy should be required to take all of the mitigation steps that would be required by a SAMA analysis (i) based on a conservative source term using release fractions no lower than those specified in NUREG-1465 or used by the NRC in studies such as NUREG 1450, cleanup to a dose rate of not more than 15 millirem a year, and at least the 95th percentile of the total consequences determined by the EARLY and CHRONC modules of the MACCS2 Code, and (ii) does not reduce any costs by use of a discount factor or probabilistic analysis.

2.)   Aging Management Program for non-EQ inaccessible electrical cables – Denied by the ASLB in August 2011

Here is what it asserts:

Entergy’s Aging Management Plan for non-environmentally qualified (EQ) inaccessible cables and cable splices at Pilgrim Station is insufficient to provide reasonable assurance that these cables will be in compliance with NRC Regulations and public health and safety shall be protected during license renewal.

3.)   Severe Accident Mitigation Alternatives (SAMA) analysis, failure to incorporate Fukushima lessons – Denied by ASLB in January 2012

Here is what is asserts:

The significant technical gap in Entergy’s SAMA to which this contention is addressed—that Entergy failed to model contaminated acqueous [sic] releases “bled” into Cape Cod Bay from the large volumes of water needed to flood the reactor (vessel, containment, pool) in a severe accident extending over an extended period of time in the type of disaster we now know is credible. This source of contamination would add to that resulting from aqueous transport and dispersion of radioactive materials through subsurface water, sediments, soils and groundwater, plus atmospheric fallout on the waters—resulting in three sources of contamination in the water. Entergy’s SAMA failed to analyze these offsite costs.

Pilgrim's license expires June 30, the renewal would be good for another 20 years.